Idle Classes

Frederick Verinder: My Neighbor's Landmark: Short Studies in Bible Land Laws (1911), Preface

Their main principle was that the holding of land, unlike the owning of commodities, carried with it a great social duty; land is the base of life, and to till the land the first of human tasks; not because a man owns it, but that he holds it as a trust from God, and must use his energy to coax the shy ground to produce more and more. This is his duty before God, the real Owner of it all. If the man is idle and ignorant, he will have to stand aside and starve. The State has to see to it that the opportunities of the land shall not be wasted; and the tiller has to do his best "that two blades may grow where there was but one before." ... Read the whole preface

Frederick Verinder: My Neighbor's Landmark: Short Studies in Bible Land Laws (1911) — 4: The Year of Jubilee: Land and Liberty

§ 6. It is plain that, under such a Law, the growth of a wealthy landlord class with large estates on the one hand, and of a landless pauper class on the other, were rendered alike impossible. Although there might be, and naturally would be, inequalities arising from varying degrees of industry, there would be no such extremes of poverty and riches as we are familiar with. The two idle classes — the wealthy idlers of the West end and the starving idlers of the East — which disgrace our modern "civilisation," could not coexist with the equality of opportunity secured by the Hebrew Law. The prayer of Agur, the son of Jakeh, perhaps represents the ideal of such a society. "Give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with food convenient for me; lest I be full and deny Thee, and say, Who is the Lord? or lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain." "The sleep of a laboring man is sweet, whether he eat little or much but the abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep. There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun, namely, riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt." A writer in the Book of Proverbs tells us that "much food is in the tilled land of the poor; but there is that is destroyed by reason of injustice," while Isaiah drives the lesson home by his description of the barrenness of the land under monopoly. "There is that withholdeth what is justly due, but it tendeth only to want. ... He that withholdeth corn [and, may we not add, he that withholdeth the land on which alone the corn can be grown], the people shall curse him" "As the partridge sitteth on eggs, and hatcheth them not; so he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool." For "better is a little with righteousness than great revenues with injustice."

146 Le but principal de cette institution etait de maintenir autant de possible l'egalite primitive du partage des terres, de reparer les perturbations arrivees dans le courant de quarante-neuf ans, et de prevenir ainsi le complet et durable apprauvissement de certaines familles plus malheureuses que d'autres (Dict. Encycl. de la Theol. Catholique, s.v., Jubile). "With the consistent administration of this 1aw, a class wholly without property would have been impossible in Israel" (Oehler, Theol. of the O.T.,i. 348). Jahn (Biblical Archaeology) well describes the Jubilee as "a regulation which prevented the rich from coming into possession [by "free trade in land"] of large tracts of land, and then leasing them out in small parcels to the poor; a practice which anciently prevailed, and does to this day, in the East." [Heinrich Hein writes: Moses endeavored to bring property into harmony with morality, with the true law of reason, and this he accomplished by the introduction of the Year of Jubilee, in which alienated land that was inherited . . . fell back to the original owner, regardless of the manner in which it had been disposed of. This institution forms the most decided contrast to that "outlawry" with the Romans, where after the lapse of a certain time the actual possessor of a property could not be compelled by the legitimate owner to return the property, if he could not bring evidence to show that he had demanded restitution in due legal form. This last condition left the field open to every possible fraud, especially in a state where despotism and jurisprudence were in bloom, and where the lawful possessor had in his power all the means of intimidation, especially when confronted by the poor man who could not afford the expenses which a contest involved. The Roman was soldier and lawyer at the same time, and he knew how to defend with his glib tongue the property taken from others, often with the sword. --S.]. ... Read the whole chapter, including footnotes

Frederick Verinder: My Neighbor's Landmark: Short Studies in Bible Land Laws (1911) —Chapter 5: Land, Labor and Learning

§ 2. In Egypt, the Israelites had suffered the bitterness of unremitting and hopeless toil. "The Egyptians made the children of Israel to serve with rigor: and they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in mortar, and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field: all their service, wherein they made them serve, was with rigor." Moses sought to teach them the needful lesson that work and rest, each in its own time and in due proportion, were both sacred; good alike for master and servant, for man and beast. There was a danger, on the one hand, that long experience of grinding slavery might have reduced the Israelites to the wretched condition in which slum-children have sometimes been found in schools in London and New York of "not knowing how to play;" a danger, on the other hand, of a violent reaction against regular work, on the ground that all work was a form of slavery. Hence the obligation to observe the Sabbath as a weekly rest-day. It was at once a holy-day and a holiday. On it, agricultural labor and trading were specifically forbidden. But it was a feast, and not a fast; and, like all the national festivals, a time of "rejoicing" for all the members of the Hebrew household, a "delight," a day of "mirth." Its observance was secured by the strongest possible sanctions. Its benefits were extended alike to native and to foreign settler, to master and to slave, to man and to beast. The sabbatical law appealed to the religious sentiment, by connecting the weekly rest-day with the rest of God the Creator; to humanitarian sympathy; and to the traditions of the race. For here, as is so often the case in the Law, the remembrance of the deliverance from slavery is appealed to as the ground of right-doing. "Remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched-out arm; therefore the Lord thy God commandeth thee to keep the Sabbath day." So important to the general welfare was the observance of this law considered, that the punishment for its infraction was death.

§ 3. Modern Sabbatarians, who, forgetting that "the Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath," seek to apply these Jewish enactments to the first day of the week, are apt to overlook the fact that the Fourth Commandment is as much a labor law as a rest law. Its opening words are, "Six days shalt thou labor." Seven days' idleness involves a much more frequent infraction of the command than seventh-day work does. "God's covenant with us" said Rahbi Akiba, "included work; for the command, 'Six days shalt thou work, and the seventh shalt thou rest,' made the 'rest' conditional upon the 'work'." "The principles of a true Sabbatarianism would necessitate the abolition alike of overwork and of idleness, the extinction of all the idle classes — of those who are idle (and rich) because they "need not work," as well as of those who are idle (and poor) because they cannot get work to do. The Church of England Catechism paraphrases the Fourth Commandment in very general terms: "To serve Him truly all the days of my life." St. Paul annotates it, from the Christian standpoint, in a very remarkable passage —

"Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which he received of us. … For even when we were with you, this we commanded you, that if any would not work, neither should he eat. For we hear that there art some which walk among you disorderly, working not at all, but are busybodies. Now them that are such we command and exhort by our Lord Jesus Christ, that with quietness they work and eat their own bread … and if any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and have no company with him, that he may be ashamed" (2 Thess. iii. 6, 10-14.) ... Read the whole chapter, including footnotes

Frederick Verinder: My Neighbor's Landmark: Short Studies in Bible Land Laws (1911) — Appendix

— brings evil upon the robbers, —

"Forasmuch therefore as ye trample upon the poor, and take exactions from him of wheat: ye have built houses of hewn stone, but ye shall not dwell in them; ye have planted pleasant vineyards, but ye shall not drink the wine thereof. For I know how manifold are your transgressions, and how mighty are your sins; ye that afflict the just, that take a bribe, and that turn aside the needy in the gate from their right" (Amos 5:11, 12 [R.V.]).

"And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear not Me, saith the Lord of Hosts" (Mal. 3:5).

"Go to now, ye rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and your silver are rusted; and their rust shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh as fire. Ye have laid up your treasure in the last days. Behold, the hire of the laborers who mowed your fields, which is if you kept back by fraud, crieth out: and the cries of them that reaped have entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. Ye have lived delicately on the earth, and taken your pleasure; ye have nourished your hearts in a day of slaughter" (Jas. 5:1-5 [R.V.]; cp. Job 20; 1 Tim. 6:9, 10, 17). ...

Luxury brings social deterioration and carelessness about national welfare.

"Woe to them that are at ease in Zion … the notable men of the chief of the nations, to whom the house of Israel come! … Ye that put far away the evil day, and cause the seat of violence to come near; that lie upon beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall; that sing idle songs to the sound of the viol; that devise for themselves instruments of music, like David's; that drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the chief ointments; but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph. Therefore now shall they go captive with the first that go captive … Saith the Lord, … I abhor the pride of Jacob, and hate his palaces: therefore will I deliver up the city with all that is therein. And it shall come to pass, if there remain ten men in one house, that they shall die. … For, behold, the Lord commandeth, and the great house shall be smitten with breaches, and the little house with clefts. … Ye have turned judgment into gall, and the fruit of righteousness into wormwood" (Amos 6:1-13 [R.V.]).

Idle and luxurious ladies —

"Moreover the Lord said, Because the daughters of Zion are haughty, and walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as they go, and making a tinkling with their feet: therefore the Lord will smite with a scab the crown of the head of the daughters of Zion, and the Lord will lay bare their secret parts. In that day the Lord will take away the bravery of their anklets, and the cauls, and the crescents; the pendants, and the bracelets, and the mufflers; the head tires, and the ankle chains, and the sashes, and the perfume boxes, and the amulets; the rings, and the nose jewels; the festival robes, and the mantles, and the shawls, and the satchels; the hand mirrors, and the fine linen, and the turbans, and the veils. And it shall come to pass, that instead of sweet spices there shall be rottenness; and instead of a girdle a rope; and instead of well set hair baldness; and instead of a stomacher a girding of sackcloth; branding instead of beauty. Thy men shall fall by the sword, and thy mighty in the war. And her gates shall lament and mourn; and she shall be desolate and sit upon the ground. And seven women shall take hold of one man in that day, saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name; take thou away our reproach" (Isa. 3:16—4:1 [R.V.]; cp. the four preceding verses, 3:12-15; 32: 9-14).

— incite their husbands to further injustice.

"Hear this word, ye kine of Bashan, that are in the mountain of Samaria, which oppress the poor, which crush the needy, which say unto their lords, Bring, and let us drink. The Lord God hath sworn by His holiness, that, lo, the days shall come upon you, that they shall take you away with hooks, and your residue with fish hooks. And ye shall go out at the breaches, every one straight before her. … And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: yet have ye not returned unto Me, saith the Lord" (Amos 4:1-3, 6 [R.V.]; and cp. the rest of the chapter). ... Read the whole appendix, including footnotes

10. The Promised Land and the Kingdom of God

The Promised Land, like Eden, is a place of unhindered scope in which to glorify God and manifest his will. But it is not the Kingdom of God. It represents liberation from external bondage — from oppression and restricted access to material opportunity. It is the temporal matrix within which the Kingdom may find full expression. But it is not itself the Kingdom. Although it is a heresy that locates this Kingdom exclusively in the afterlife or an ethereal paradise, Jesus declared it to be "not of this world" (John 18:36) but "within" (Luke 17:21). It is no reproach to Henry George that he lost sight of this distinction between the Promised Land and the Kingdom of God, enraptured by his vision of a just society:

With want destroyed; with greed changed to noble passions; with the fraternity that is born of equality taking the place of jealousy and fear that now array men against each other; with mental power loosed by conditions that give to the humblest comfort and leisure; and who shall measure the heights to which our civilization may soar? Words fail the thought! It is the Golden Age.... It is the culmination of Christianity — the City of God on earth, with walls of jasper and gates of pearl! It is the reign of the Prince of Peace!

By equalizing opportunity, political and economic liberation tend to draw both poor and rich into the middle class. As an expression of social justice, this constitutes a genuine advance, ethical as well as material. But it is no easy guarantee of spiritual gain. Middle-class traits include virtues such as industry, thrift, restraint, commercial and professional rectitude, but, on the other hand, low prudentialism, self-satisfaction, and an inclination to regard material well-being as a sign of righteousness. Hence, even in the Promised Land, what Paulo Freire calls "conscientization" (roughly, consciousness-raising through social commitment), emphasized and refined by liberation theology, must continue although in a different vein. The Kingdom of God will flourish only when outward liberation gives rise to inward liberation, a victory over the limitations of the bourgeois ethos.

"The Earth Is the Lord's" (Psalm 24:1). This statement tells us something about God. He is attached to the land and loves it. He is not a spiritual abstraction oblivious to the Wasteland in which we live. God is the maker of the world of eating and sleeping, working and begetting. It also tells us something of our place in this world. With God as the true owner of the earth, every person has a right to the produce which equitable usufruct yields to his or her efforts.

To recognize that "the earth is the Lord's" is to see that the same God who established communities has also in his providence ordained for them, through the land itself, a just source of revenue. Yet, in the Wasteland in which we live, this revenue goes mainly into the pockets of monopolists, while communities meet their needs by extorting individuals the fruits of their honest toil. If ever there were any doubt that structural sin exists, our present system of taxation is the proof. Everywhere we see governments penalizing individuals for their industry and creativity, while the socially produced value of land is reaped by speculators in exact proportion to the land which they withhold. The greater the Wasteland, the greater the reward. Does this comport with any divine plan, or notion of justice and human rights? Or does it not, rather, perpetuate the Wasteland and prevent the realization of the Promised Land?

This not meant to suggest that land monopolists and speculators have a corner on acquisitiveness or the "profit motive," which is a well-nigh universal fact of human nature. As a group, they are no more sinful than are people at large, except to the degree that they knowingly obstruct reforms aimed at removing the basis of exploitation. Many abide by the dictum: "If one has to live under a corrupt system, it is better to be a beneficiary than a victim of it."

But they do not have to live under a corrupt system; no one does. The profit motive can be channeled in ways that are socially desirable as well as in ways that are socially destructive. Let us give testimony to our faith that the earth is the Lord's by building a social order in which there are no victims. ... Read the whole synopsis